Ducky

They must have changed their name - as it used to be known as Seasons in the Park. Hard to imagine a nicer location on a sunny day - although the view is slowly disappearing as the trees in the surrounding park keep growing. The food is very middle of the road and reliable. Nothing adventurous - but usually good. Grilled salmon, Alaska black cod, pepper steak, ceasar salad, seafood pasta...that sort of thing. It is my old mom's favourite restaurant - and that probably says it all. The crowd that is usually there all look like her friends. On Sunday lunches you have to negotiate through a forest of Zimmer frames on the way to your table. Over the years me mum and I must have eaten there - either alone or with a larger group - at least several dozen times. I can't say I have ever had a bad meal there. I also can't say I have ever had a truly great meal either. That said the spectacular setting usually more than makes up for the ho hum food. Particularly in the summer. And the patio is lovely. And you can do absolutely nothing wrong with the Seafood Pasta and a bottle of Blue Mountain Pinot Gris.

Do you mean Seasons in the Park - on Little Mountain? If so I can tell you lots about it as my dear old mom drags me there with great regularity.

Does anyone know whether Basa - which is farmed in Vietnam - has any of the same problems we associate with farmed Salmon in BC?

We generally inject when the piece of meat (usually) is sufficiently large that a marinade alone would not penetrate to the middle - such as the examples I gave. We inject the alcohol at the beginning of the cooking process - and do this in addition to a complementary marinade. The injected alchohol then infuses the meat with flavour while cooking - whilst the alchohol presumeably evaporates. Having a large bore needle is great as it will allow you to inject more viscous liquids such as marinades. In fact I learned this technique from an old friend who was studying vetinary medicine at the time and had access to the very fine but larger bore needles used by vetinarians. Recently I simmered some garlic, rosemary, sage and salt and pepper in some Retsina, skimmed off the herbs and injected the liquid into a large leg of lamb which was subsequently slow roasted. The result was sensational!

Years ago Mimi Sheraton wrote a cookbook entitled "The Seducers Cookbook". This is a real gem, and I was fortunate to have it given to me as a present very early on in life. It contains a series of menus for different situations - and these are all delightful and reliable. It's well worth searching your local used bookshops for one of these

As we have several doctors in the family I have always had hypodermic needles available for cooking. They can be used to great effect in the kitchen, and really your only limitation here is your own creativity. In our house the needle is usually employed to inject some form of alchohol into food. For example, take a watermelon and inject some rum into it in a few different places and then let it sit in a cold refrigerator for the day. Or inject a ham with some Jack Daniels prior to baking. Ouzo into lamb. Red wine and/or brandy into roast beef. Calvados into pork. And so it goes.

The Slavic gentleman in front of Chapters at Broadway and Granville gets my vote. But perhaps he moves down to Future Shop from time to time and is the same person to whom others have made reference. Also the "Kaisereck" in the GIM is worth mentioning.

Could it be the critical thing: that at this point you need to pour yourself a large glass of good Rose from the Luberon or Bandol?

Strange as this may seem - we were served some very good croissants at a brunch the other day - and when I asked where they were from the improbable reply was "Costco"!

All right Jackal 10, I do this most reluctantly, but after seven pages of your splendid blog I just have to ask: What exactly is your cholesterol count?

You are talking "classic" Nicoise? As far as i know this is always made with canned tuna. At least I have never had this served with fresh tuna in France - though I have, ocassionally, in North America.

Well, I for one don't think that's naive. That is what we should be doing. Foodie girl has a less than flavourful salmon at Lumiere, posts about it, others jump on the bandwagon and now we are composing ballads about the emporer having no clothes?? Does this not strike anyone else as a bit OTT? I don't know Rob Feenie (although I sort of feel like I do from his current overexposure on the back of buses etc.), nor do I have shares in his business. But I have eaten at Lumiere a few times and the meals were as fine as any I have had in this town. We discussed this at dinner last night and all agreed that what is currently happening on this thread is a bit of Schadenfreude - an untranslatable German word that describes the peculiar joy we sometimes derive from the misfortunes of others. (Conrad Black loses his shirt etc) Combine this with the highly developed Canadian "tall poppy" syndrome - and no wonder everyone jumps on the bandwagon to rubbish Lumiere because someone had a "less than stellar" meal there. It's like being nibbled to death by ducks. I had better go and take my Prozac before I forget.

Well since I contributed to this debate initially I should add my $0.02 worth. I agree with you entirely that a forum such as this is all about people being free to be critical of the meals they have. However anyone who follows this forum will also realize that very occasionally such critical reviews are seriously overstated or uninformed or malicious or just plain boring. My only criticsm of Foodie girls review was the opening line "I am still trying to get the taste out of my mouth after a dinner at Lumiere" - or words to that effect. I thought that was probably a gross overstatement - and nothing I have since read in that thread leads me to think otherwise. So the foi gras in soup was not a combination of textures she enjoyed. So the salmon wasn't quite as flavourful as she had hoped. All valid points - but none which, in my view, justify her opening salvo. Others have made this point, but a forum of this sort is about exchanging information. The utility of a post - I find - tends to increase in direct proportion to the information it contains. And of course by information I don't mean information of the "I liked the taste of that hamburger" kind of information. So to me, its not really about whether we are too nice or not nice enough in this forum - but rather how meaningful the information is. By all means be critical. But back this up with information. (Remember the Irish Heather thread?) And if it must be hyperbole - then I suggest a quick course in "Hyperbole as a Literary Device" (Hyperbole 101). I believe Mr. Talent teaches this to great effect.

To me, this read as ignorant - your subjective opinion based on your tastes, palate, experience in Tibet is your own. ← Yes, my subjective experiences are my own - as are the opinions I form as a result of those experiences. So far you have stated nothing here that would incline me to change those opinions. For some reason you keep suggesting that I am ignorant because I do not share your views. From what I have read above, I am very happy not to share your views. If you can convince me that Tibetan cuisine is something I should in future be seeking out - I would love to hear from you. If not, I think I will take my pail and shovel and play in another sandbox.

Surely this was unnecessary. ← Yes, it probably was. Thank you for pointing this out.

I rest my case.

Well, 3W, this kind of invective leaves me a bit cold. My point was really quite modest, viz., that during two weeks in Tibet we found no culinary offerings whatsoever (and believe me, we did look) that would incline us to seek out a Tibetan restaurant in Vancouver. I made this point in reply to post that speculated why a Tibetan restaurant on Broadway might have disappeared rather quickly. Based on my experience, I think I understand why this restaurant might have failed. If there is something I am missing about Tibetan cuisine - please enlighten me. It's a tired point perhaps, but not all cuisines are equally interesting - and there is a reason for this.

Surely this was unnecessary. I can imagine that perhaps in one or the other dish your exceptionally high personal expectations were not met, or perhaps you had a bad night, or perhaps you are from planet Klingon, but to say that you are "still trying to get the bad taste out" of your mouth after a meal at Lumiere must rank as one of the more egregious exaggerations ever posted in this forum.

Sorry about the last post. I think you are right in this. But also - having once been to Tibet - I am not sure there is much of a cuisine there - though I would like to think I'm wrong in this. The place is landlocked and bog-poor and most people are just subsistence farmers. We saw lots of bad Chinese food to be had there - and some local Yak-derived things that don't bear mention in this forum. Perhaps there were some distinct and interesting culinary traditions in Tibet in former times. Does anyone know? I saw the sign on Broadway for a few months, but found the prospect about as exciting as, say, a Rawandan restaurant.

I like the fact that they always have the latest kitchen gizmos. Plus where else can you buy a chef's jacket and hat?

Feedbag: You are right about bad food in the Plaka. But this is the "clip-strip" where tourists are fleeced in the most shameless way, and the locals always avoid it. If you tell an Athenian that you are going to the Plaka for dinner - they will just shake their head in pity and shame. We have always eaten very well in Greece. You have to ask your way around a bit and find out where the locals eat. This is critically important in Greece because, unfortunately, given the vast numbers of tourists that Greece sees each year, countless dreadful, soulless restaurants have sprung up to feed rubbish to the tourists. These kinds of establishments are everywhere in Greece and are not representative of what I would consider authentic Greek cooking. This "let's rip off the tourists" mentality is of course not confined to Greece.

No, sorry. I have never tried their take-out.

I agree with you about the disconnect in the case of Italy - but would add all Mediterranean cuisines to the list. I mean you can go to any restaurant in any village on any island in Greece and have just a Greek salad that will bring tears to your eyes. And you will ask yourself WTF is it about this tomato, cucumber, onion, feta and olive oil that makes it so brilliant - and the answer has to be, as Keith points out, the terroir. I once had a meal in the mountains of Crete (with some shepherds) which consisted of raw garlic, bread, olive oil and Retsina chilled in a stream. You ate a clove of garlic, followed this up with a large piece of bread dripping in olive oil and an ice cold cup of Retsina. This meal will stay with me as one of my personal top ten. Why? Well "terroir" is as good a reason as any. Now Italy is a country of regional cuisines, and in Vancouver most Italian places try to be all things to all people. That's the beginning of the problem. I applaud Addesso and a few others for narrowing their focus. (Whatever happened to Piccolo Mondo - which used to be brilliant about 15 years ago?) In the Med. - less is always more. Keep it fresh, simple and almost Zen-like pure. Think of sage-fed lamb cutlets grillet over a charcoal brazier (Greece). Tomato and garlic bruschetta (Italy). Grilled Serrano-ham wrapped sardines with lemon (Spain).... Is Vancouver ready for a restaurant that sets these priorities? I'm really not sure. But if anyone is interested in this concept - please PM me.

Connie's does what it does very well. It's low-brow Chinese food - perhaps better described as the sort of Chinese food expected by diners who don't know (or care to know) a whole lot about Chinese food. It's the sort of Chinese food that was standard fare in Vancouver 30 years ago, before the great influx of Chinese people with their more diverse and highly developed culinary traditions. Connie's is the place ginger beef, won ton soup, pepper prawns, hot and sour soup, Singapore noodles etc etc etc. You will seldom see an Asian person eating at Connie's - except for the odd CBC - and there is a reason for this. That said, everything we have ever had at Connie's has been well prepared and fresh - and of course cooked withour msg. In addition the place is clean and has a certain charm. What's not to like about this?